December 03, 2004 - It must be said, right up front, to avoid any possibility that you might think I was trying to awkwardly shoe horn a blurb-worthy superlative into the rest of my thorough but measured review of Closer: this film features the best performance of Julia Roberts' career. In fact, here's another, just to get the ad copy rhetoric out of the way: Clive Owen commands the screen in an Oscar-worthy performance.

Both of these observations are admittedly ridiculous promotional pabulum, and yet there's no denying that all of them are completely true. But under the weight of more nuanced descriptions of the film's merits (particularly in light of the recent bottom-line reduction of film criticism to blub-worthy catchphrases), it's hard to generate a lot of public interest in a movie that can best be described as the antithesis of virtually every project that mainstream Hollywood has put forth in the past 25 years about romance or relationships.

The film follows a quartet of single people who quickly become ensconced in relationships, inter-relationships, affairs, flings, and all sorts of clandestine alliances. Dan (Jude Law) is the catalyst for the group's commingling trysts; he first meets Alice (Natalie Portman) after rescuing her from an accident, and the two quickly fall into comfortable couple-hood. While shooting photos for his forthcoming book's cover, he meets Anna (Roberts), with whom he falls instantly in love, and begins a slow campaign of seduction to win her heart.

Later, in a chat room, he successfully tricks Larry (Owen), a doctor with a penchant for online porn, and suggests they 'meet' for a real-time rendezvous. Anna happens to be hanging out at the exact spot where Larry is to meet his would-be paramour, and they quickly fall into the rhythms of a relationship without quite realizing it.

	Jude Law and Julia Roberts in Closer

Cut to a year and more down the line, and both couples are perfunctorily conjoined; Dan and Anna love one another irregardless of their respective partners, and Alice and Larry live in blissful denial that their relationships are anything short of picture-perfect. But when Dan and Anna reveal the longtime deception of their lovers' confidences, the foursome falls into steep disrepair; hearts bursting with love are blackened by betrayal, other burning with passion smoulder beneath the weight of guilt, and thoughts turn from reconciliation to revenge. Larry, once a dedicated boyfriend and husband, becomes a scheming instigator bent on destroying Anna's happiness; Anna, consumed with guilt, betrays Dan and then herself; Dan, insecure and desperate, finds that the wounds he inflicted – as much to himself as to Anna and Alice – run too deep to heal; and Alice, betrayed but resilient, disappears into a life detached from emotional commitment.

Nichols carves up the solace of our rom-com happy ending expectations in the first fifteen minutes of the film – no cheerful reconciliation will be arrived at here – but he leaves the trimmings for us to sort through; these are not characters we comfortably identify with, because their actions seem openly malicious and destructive, but we cannot deny the truths that the film dares to reveal. Thankfully, Nichols enlists four actors who are more than game for the film's emotional heavy lifting, and they attack their roles with almost as much ferocity as the characters attack one another.